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They were all positive, Lily had whispered that night as Silas wrenched a pillow free to keep her on her side. I took five tests, Si. We’re having a baby.

“She’s just drunk,” Silas said with his face in Sarah’s neck. Every time he opened his eyes, he saw his future, and he didn’t want to see anything just then. “I have something for you.”

He slipped his hand between them, his fingers pressing against her zipper. She bit his earlobe as he wrestled free a pill from his front pocket, a white circle with a slash through it. With a grin, Sarah stuck out her tongue, and Silas placed the pill just behind the round black gem in its middle.

“Let’s go swimming!” she said as she pushed off him and peeled off her shirt.



* * *



—

SILAS, ADULT AND DRUNK, broke into the clearing before he expected to, and it sent the whole world spinning, one part whiskey, one part phantom thrumming from the bike’s engine, one part kick-you-in-the-gut kind of starlight. There was no moon, which made the lake darker than usual, like a pool of ink. But without a moon, the stars were bellowing.



* * *



—

“THAT’S INSANE,” SARAH SAID, her voice carrying over the water. They were on the float, and her tan lines popped in the darkness like they were under a black light. “It’s your life too. She could get an abortion, you know. Or put the baby up for adoption. You have a say in this.”

“It’s not that easy.”

“Not if you’re a pussy,” she spat. He had never seen her angry before. Not like that, not in defense of anyone but herself. He watched her face and thought, sadly, that he had found his proof. She cared about him.

“Whatever,” she said, running a hand along her body. “Apparently you’re not the only Harrison who wants this.”

“Ignore Lily,” Silas said. “She’s just trying to get a rise out of you.”

“It wasn’t Lily who told me.”

“Who?”

“He did,” she said, rolling away and facing the stars. Her speech was slowing under the blanket of Oxy. “Phil told me himself.”

“You’re lying.”

She sat up then, all the flirt drained clean out of her rage.

“Fuck you, Silas. Maybe I should be with him; maybe I chose the wrong brother. The weak one.”

“Sarah—”

“Fuck you!” she screamed so loudly that birds took flight.

Silas looked over his shoulder at the house, watching for a light to turn on. He checked the Watersons’ next door, but all windows stayed dark.

“Stop yelling,” he hissed. “They’ll find us.”

But she was done talking, he realized as she started to sit up. She was only going to be yelling now.

“Fuck you! Fuck you! Fuck—”

Silas slapped a palm over her mouth, and her skull bounced the three inches back down to the float like a basketball.

“Shit,” he whispered, removing his hand almost as quickly as he had put it there. “Shit, are you all right?”

“Fuck you,” she said again, but at least she said it quietly.



* * *



—

SILAS HEARD A SPLASH and steadied himself on a tree, caught in the line between reality and memory. But the lake stayed dark. He reached again for the bottle, forgetting it wasn’t there. He wiped his hands on his jeans. His legs still vibrated from the bike, as if he were just another cricket in the dark.

“Phil,” he said to nothing, slamming his palm against the bark. “Goddamnit.”

Then he heard another splash, and there she was.

His wish that superseded all of his other wishes. The thing that would’ve saved them all. Sarah, leaving the water. Walking tall.





PEYOTE





RIGHT WHEN I RELEASED Cal, or rather, right as she broke, easily, from my grip, my tablet let out a series of insistent beeps.

I knew that sound.

One of my marks was disconnecting.

On the Fifth Floor, “disconnected” is the polite word for humans who die before we can sign them. Or maybe “polite” isn’t right. “Technical” would be better. Throughout my time in the Deals Department, millions of my targets had disconnected. But never once before had my heart gone anywhere in response, let alone to my throat.

Even before the screen loaded, I knew it was one of the Harrisons.

“Cal,” I said, tapping the screen, “I need to go.”

“What?”

“I know you have your own plan here, but I have another one. Just hear me out.”

Cal surprised us both by nodding, and I went on before she had time to change her mind.

“When—” I swallowed, embarrassed that I still couldn’t manage to unfold the paper in my pocket. “When was my deal? What year? If you remember everything, then you’ll remember when you were alive. I’ve been drinking the water this whole time, so I have no idea. Did my time overlap with your time on Earth?”

“Why do you think I’d know anything about your—”

“Obviously you read it. Just tell me.”

Cal swallowed. “Yeah, actually. It did. In the thirties.” She squinted in thought. “1937.”